In Uganda, low government investment in reproductive health commodities has resulted in an acute condom shortage. The previous minimum stock level of six months has been lowered to four months, because of the bulkiness of condoms. The problem is that after manufacturing, condoms are not shipped immediately. 220 million condoms are needed annually, but only 80-120 millions are imported.

Australian Reproductive Health Alliance (ARHA) will host a workshop at the upcoming UN DPI/NGO Conference in Melbourne. ARHA’s workshop is entitled “How to set-up effective NGO and Parliamentary alliances to facilitate political support for achieving the MDGs”. The workshop will be a case study of how ARHA and NGOs collaborated with the Parliamentary Group on Population and Development on the campaigns to lift the ban on RU486 and change the AusAID Family Planning Guidelines. Speakers will include Senators Claire Moore and Judith Troeth and ARHA members. Workshop details will be made available shortly.

Population Action Interntional is launching a new documentary entitled ‘Empty Handed: Responding to the Demand for Contraceptives’. The film premiered on June 9th at Women Deliver, a global conference focused on improving maternal, newborn and reproductive health.

“The Maternal Health Task Force is working with Population Action International (PAI) to apply the lessons learned from the reproductive health supplies movement to the maternal health field, in order to ensure that women throughout the world have access to all the reproductive and maternal health supplies they need. PAI is facilitating the inclusion and engagement of maternal health groups as active members of the Reproductive Health Supplies Coalition (RHSC), promoting the adoption of maternal health supplies as a priority issue of the RHSC, and promoting the adoption of the supply issue into maternal health organizations’ technical and advocacy priorities.”

A workshop entitled ‘Strategic Options for NGOs (SONGs), A roadmap for SRHR NGOs towards 2014/2015 and beyond’ will take place from June 30th to July 2nd 2010 and in Brussels, Belgium. The strategic workshop will update EuroNGOs members and ‘Southern’ partners on the trategic options for NGOs towards 2015 suggested by the Berlin Forum.